Clipped Wings
by EphemeralHeartbeat
Summary: Instead of flying to adulthood as Robins, the Batfamily claw their way through the years as Catlads and Strays. This would have been their life, snippets, at the least, had they grown up under Selina's caring wing. Catlad!AU
1. Chapter 1

**"Kyle," She says and takes Bruce's open hand, feels his strong grip as he shakes, "Call me Selina. You must be Bruce Wayne."**

* * *

She isn't sure how long she's standing there, behind the brick corner of the Wayne Manor in her tight black dress and heels, but soon enough she finds one loner rich boy, young with a nice suit and already drunk enough for her tastes, and she gets to flaunter her body at him and sweet talk her way into becoming his date.

He walks her up the Manor steps like a gentleman, acts everything but that, and she stares at the Butler at the entrance as her date gives him the invitation and conveniently forgets her name. As soon as she gets into the ball room where all the crooked old and spoiled young are conversing and talking she ditches the guy.

There's a soft music playing in the background, something she'd expect her grandfather to have listened to on the radio, and she goes about looking for people to rob. This wasn't her usual style—and she would have gone with her other high-heeled, tight black outfit if the security in this place hadn't taught her a lesson the first time—but it was easy money and she didn't feel like taking unnecessary risks and accidentally becoming bed ridden or dead before she gets to see TabbyCat give birth to her kittens.

Her hand is down some guy's pants pocket feeling for a wallet when Bruce Wayne taps her on the shoulder. Her hand swipes back fast enough that she doubts he noticed, the guy who's pocket she was in didn't even notice, and she smiles sweetly at him. "Hi."

Bruce looks sincerely confused, staring at her and says, "I don't know you, do I?"

"Kyle," She says and takes Bruce's open hand, feels his strong grip as he shakes, "Call me Selina. You must be Bruce Wayne."

"Of course," he laughs, has that same haughty air as the guy she walked in with, smells like roses instead of alcohol and is a whole foot taller. "I try to know everyone who comes to my banquets. Kyle wouldn't happen to be the same name that runs all those endangered species programs, would it?"

She smiles and says, "It would be," and walks with him when he starts to make his way to the buffet table, is about to reach her hand into his pocket and swipe whatever's there when he shifts and fills them up with his own hands, "I think animals deserve better than what we give them. They're just as essential to the world's existence as we are, healthier to the world than we are, too."

He laughs again, all charisma and teeth and says, "That's a statement I can agree with." He grabs a Champagne from that same one butler and Selina wonders how the man runs this place by himself, and he leans against the table. "What brings you here, Ms. Kyle? I don't remember sending you something in the mail, and I would have remembered a face as pretty as yours, had we met before."

"A date," She rolls her eyes.

Bruce raises his, "And where would he be?"

She shrugs her shoulders, scans her eyes across the crowed and sees him with a chick in his lap that's got more skin showing than Selina does herself. She grabs an apple and leans against the table next to Mr. Wayne, "He was a jerk anyway."

The rest of the evening is just talking to him, and she had been planning to take more but it turns out Wayne's charms were all people make it out to be, and the time flew before she even realized she should probably start going. She's surprised he doesn't offer her to stay later, doesn't try to charm her into his bed, and she watches as he walks though the crowd and finds a different girl- one Selina's sure he hasn't even talked to that night- and he takes her hand and leaves with her instead.

Later in her apartment, bored to death and ignoring the sound of breathy moans and sequels and pleads coming from behind Ivy and Harley's closed doors, she searches through her hand bag, pouting about the amount of things she didn't get to take because she was too busy talking. She finds the small piece of paper scrunched up and scribbled on then, and she doesn't remember putting it there, doesn't even remember Wayne offering it to her.

She rolls her eyes and laughs at him, but she picks up her phone and dials it in anyway, knowing that any other girl would date Wayne for the same reason as she; the money.

* * *

 **Considering this is a Catlad AU for ALL of the Robins, I'm going to start with Dick. he comes in pretty soon.**

 **XD**

 **R &R!**

 **P.S. I'm going to have a "Summary" at the beginning of every chapter, because on AO3, I actually have these as one shots that are part of a series. There may never actually be an "End" to this series, Just Ideas of how their lives might have been, or how this world is different, or stuff like that. If you guys have any Ideas, be free to tell me in the comments or with a PM!**


	2. Chapter 2

**She didn't expect the sight of a falling kid to hit her so hard.**

* * *

She didn't expect the feeling of being able to talk to someone so late at night to feel so nice, but it was, nicer than she ever remembered it being. Bruce- and she told herself to call him that and not Mr. Wayne because this far into the relationship that would be _weird_ \- took her out and bought her stuff to the point that her room looked like a tornado of dresses and shoes, and she was sure that if she really let him (and wasn't quite sure why she _wasn't_ letting him) he would pay for her rent and her insurance and everything else she could possibly need.

He talked a lot, too. Most of it was fluff, the kind of buff that she used herself while seducing her way out of some sticky situation, but every once in a while she'd catch something he'd say that was too out of place to be anything other than the truth. But even the bullshit was soothing in a way that was just letting someone else talk to the point that their voice becomes background noise.

"You never ask for anything, you know," He says one night. The phone is on speaker and Selina's lying in her bed, paying with one of the pretty, sharp, black knives that Harley leaves hanging around the house. "Don't you need anything?"

"If I need it," Selina sighs, and she can tell that he's expecting something like, _I would have asked for it already_ , or something like that, "I take it."

He chuckles, "That you do," And she snorts, saying, "Do you have a problem with that, Mr. Wayne?" And she curses herself for a second before she realizes it sound playful.

"Hum," he hums lightly, "The lack of manners wounds me, Ms. Kyle."

"It never seemed to bother you before," she purrs,

"That was under," He takes a quick intake of breath, " _different_ circumstances." He barks out a laugh just as she rolls her eyes, and then he invites her out to some other Wayne event, one with a big tent and casual clothes that consisted of baseball caps and sunglasses so they could avoid the paparazzi until absolutely necessary.

For the amount of time Wayne spends on camera, Selina would have figured that he would be worse at avoiding the cameras, but it turns out dodging them was his specialty. She'd be ready to throw a dart, or maybe they'd just be wandering around aimlessly, and he'd randomly grab her arm and pull her behind a booth or casually drag her into a group with people tall enough that she would have to jump to look over their shoulders, and seconds later a group of paparazzi would trudge around the corner.

He would usually wink at her from under the brim of his cap, and she would _have_ to give him credit, because half of the time she didn't even realize they were there and dodging people was her specialty, too.

Eventually they head to the Big Tent where he hides in a corner and gets out of his casual clothes, reveals a nice tux that probably costs more than the circus is making in a year, and he puts on that blinding smile and takes her hand, walks her to his reserved seat at the front and she suddenly remembers that _Bruce_ is the one who pays for the circus to come across seas every year.

They're halfway through the show, talking and whispering to each other like any other couple should do, when Bruce shushes her and tells her to watch, says, "This is the part I pay to see."

"You pay that much money just to see this?" She murmured and flicked another piece of popcorn into her mouth. "It must be good, then."

"It is," He sighs. "The best."

Selina watches the performers skip to the middle of the ring, just three of them, and then watches them walk over to the large platforms and start climbing. "Trapeze?" She whispers, and Bruce nods. Her eyes follow the little one trailing behind his mother smiling like it was the best day of his life, and vaguely listens to the announcement that this is his first time preforming like his parents, without the safety of the net.

Selina raises her eyebrow and watches them jump, flip, and has to admit that they were good, that if the little one was nervous he didn't show it. She wasn't sure they were good enough for her to pay for their trip overseas, but she glances over at Bruce and knows he definitely thinks it is. He isn't smiling the way she thought he would be, or maybe that glossy-eyed look she's seen people get when they get really into a movie and forget about the world (she doesn't realize she's never seen Bruce with that look) but he's got an intense stare, dark and focused, a facial expression she didn't even know he could pull.

It takes her a while to realize his eyes are following the little one, and she shoves him slightly with her shoulder. "What's the kitten's name?"

His eyes break away for a second to glance at her before training back on the Flying Graysons, and he says in a low voice, "Richard."

"He's good," She says and pulls Bruce's coat tighter around her shoulders, doesn't quite remember when she took it and is sure she's ruining it somehow.

"I know," His voice rumbles, dark and matching the intensity in his eyes. "I've been watching him for a while."

She decides to ignore the comment, to pretend it didn't sound creepy and she rests her head on his shoulder, huffing air and pouting. It probably would have sounded fine if Ivy hadn't spent the past weeks showing her every dirty article on Wayne, telling her her boyfriend is a creep, but a rich creep, and a kind of creep that's worth the money.

She isn't sure how far into the show they are, when the rope snaps and the parents fall. She just remembers watching the little one, thinking that he got lucky when his rope snapped, that he was lucky his momentum got him far enough to grip the edge of one of the platforms. He was shaking while he tried to pull himself over the ledge and Bruce jumps to his feet next to her, runs towards the center ring when everyone else is running away and hugs the boy when he reaches the bottom of the ladder, buries the small face in his shoulder and doesn't let the kitten look at his parents' bodies, doesn't let him see the blood and the bones and the cruelty of the world.

Selina couldn't move from her seat if she tried, just gripped the arm rests and tries to remember how to breath. She doesn't even realize she's crying until she puts a hand to cover her open mouth and feels the slick, warm wetness on her cheeks.

* * *

 **... _I had fun._**

 ** _R &R!_**


	3. Chapter 3

**She's never helped a kid before, not like this, but she just has a pull in her heart that tells her she has to do it, has to save him before he falls deeper into the mentality of Gotham's hopelessness, of its destruction and its disease.**

 **Warning: While there's no _actual_ sexual child abuse, it definitely hints to it.**

* * *

"You know, I've been thinking," Bruce starts one night, and Selina is balancing the phone on her shoulder, trying to hold her bowl with one hand and finding some salt with the other, "of taking Richard in."

"Taking him in?" She asks, with an almost mock disbelief and catches a glimps of the salt on the table, walks toward it and sees it resting on Ivy's magazines, folded so it was open to a page where Bruce was on the front, rolls her eyes because she already knows what Ivy thinks of Bruce. "That doesn't seem like you."

She hears the scoff on the other side of the line, wonders if Bruce has been thinking about it since the night of the circus, and he says, "People change." There's a _snap_ and he grunts, deep and low, almost painfully and she asks if he's okay, says that he's fine. "I just- I talk about kids with similar experiences to mine, talk about helping them. Maybe it's about time I actually did something."

"He was put in the juvi, Bruce," Selina says. "It may have been the work of a racist bastard, but by the time you get to him, he'll already have been eaten alive."

He sighs and she sits down at the table, flips through the magazine and adds the salt, takes the phone in her hand and puts the first spoonful in her mouth. He says, "I know," and then stops, and she doesn't have anything to say so she doesn't, then he adds, "It's all the more reason to save him."

* * *

Within minutes Selina finds herself in her other high-heeled, tight black outfit running across rooftops and wondering what she was doing without actually stopping to think about it. She's known the streets since she was a kid, known the alleys like they were her home, because when she was small, they _were._ The first time she ran over them instead of through them she had gotten lost, because the angle had been off and everything looked so different from the rooftops, but now she recognizes all the streets, right side up, twisted and upside down.

She also happens to recognize the tall, dark and broody down in one of the many alleyways that she had huddled in as a child for warmth, and she crouches, watches him fight a dozen or so thugs with ease. She laughs at the ears, because for such a dark figure they _were_ kind of ridiculous, and then continues on, because she knows that she's on the wrong side of the law to have a conversation with the Bat, knows that she's lucky she hasn't had one yet.

She reaches the Juvenile Center sooner then she thinks she would, being lost in her own thoughts, and she struggles to remember the ways she used as a child to get in and out. Some of the ways she was too big for, she knew, some had already been repaired, but there was one way she remembers, one that was through a hand-dug tunnel that lead straight to a hallway. She remembers that no one was sure where the heck the tunnel came from, but no one was going to tell.

She runs around to the back of the building, on the inside of the fence (and she mentally laughs at it, because it was too easy to get in, almost like they weren't trying, she doesn't think about the fact that they probably weren't) until she reaches a bush, overgrown like everything else on the grounds and has to slice some of the branches away to fit. The small hole right beside the trunk is bigger than she remembers it being, but she still doesn't know if it's big enough. She tries anyway.

The only way she manages to fit is on her stomach, knees straight behind her and arms extended forward, her cheek dragging against the dirt bottom. She wonders why she didn't go in any of the easier ways, like waltzing through the front door and taking the guards head-on (They were mostly overweight and drunks anyway) and then remembers that the kid was probably in shock, abused, and the last thing he needs was a woman in black taking him with a flurry of confusion and alarms and curses.

Selina doesn't want to take him, she wants him to come with her. If that makes any sense.

Eventually, with the speed of a snail, her fingertips hit a wall of dirt, and she realizes that it leads straight up a couple of feet towards the exit. She has to bend her back awkwardly and her head brushes the smooth back side of a tile, but It's slightly more roomy and she can move her arms if she squeezes enough. She lifts the tile high enough so that her eyes can see the hallway and check for any people, and she doesn't see feet, so she strains and grabs her whip, pushes off the tile and flicks the long thong at the camera as quickly as she can, hears the satisfying _crack_ of the popper as it hits its destination.

She pushes herself up, knows that if things haven't changed, it'll be a while before one of the guards notice the camera is down. The building still smells like a hospital, Selina remembers the rumors flying that it used to be one, before they redid it to hold children instead of the sick, and she walks down the hallways, whipping the cameras as she goes, looking at the closed and locked doors, looking for the name _Grayson_.

The lights are dim but she recognizes the name immediately, sees a colored picture taped to the front of the door and wonders how the kitten convinced the guards to let him do that, and she crouches down to pick the lock.

It doesn't take long, and she pushes the door inward, lets the little light from the hallway seep into his windowless room. She sees the small figure on the bed and laughs because she never remembers actually going to sleep when it was lights out, and she gently shakes him awake.

He's cute when he wakes up, actually lets out a little mewl as he rubs his eyes and sits up, and Selina can't help the bittersweet smile that touches her lips, because she knows there would have been no way some of the guards held back their temptations with an innocent child like him.

His big eyes lock on her goggles, but he doesn't say anything, just watches her, and she whispers, "Hi."

He swings his legs over the edge of the bed to reveal his pajamas, and he sighs, "I don't want to do this," but his hand reaches the collar of his shirt to undo the first button anyway, his eyes watering.

Selina reaches her hand and stops his, pushes it back onto the bed and says, "I don't want that either." She stands him up, knows what he must be thinking, but says, "I want to take you away from here, Dick."

Suspicion immediately clouds his eyes and he takes a step back, questions, "Why?" and Selina can feel her heart crack at the thought that he's already thinking like a Gothamite.

"My name," She says, "It's Selina." She doesn't answer his question, comes to realization that she doesn't know _how_ , because she's never helped a kid before, not like this, but she just has a pull in her heart that tells her she has to do it, has to save him before he falls deeper into the mentality of Gotham's hopelessness, of its destruction and its disease.

She ends up taking too long to continue talking, isn't sure how long she would have taken if the alarm hadn't started ringing, and she grabs his hand and runs, realizes that he quietly follows and wonders how much emotion he's let himself feel for the past couple of weeks, because god knows that she knows it's easier to shut down. She has to take down a dozen or so of the drunks before she reaches the tile, shoves it aside and he jumps in without being asked, her following right after.

The tile is closed on top of her and she's sitting, her legs in the flat part of the tunnel and her torso straight up, and she realizes she's going to have to awkwardly scoot on her _back_ now. She can hear people's footsteps frantically moving above her, and by her feet she can feel Dick starting to move. She's surprised by how heavily she's breathing, knows that it's more because she had been worried for Dick than because it was hard, and she follows him. It doesn't take long for them to get over the fence once they reach it, although it is harder, both because of the alarms and the kitten, but once they make it over, they're free to run.

Halfway to her apartment he gets tired and she carries him on her back, finds out it's not a good idea to do a flip with a sleeping child clinging to you, and then makes it to her unlocked window and slides it open, drops inside and lays him on the couch. She hears a crinkle and sees a crumpled piece of paper in his fist, wonders when he had the time to grab it and gently pries it from his fingers, smooths it out to look at it. It takes her a while to realize it's his family, all flying through the air in a poor imitation of the Grayson poster she had seen on the outside of the big tent, and she smiles sweetly and hangs it up on the fridge next to Harley's evil looking Joker, and then curls up on the foot of the couch to fall asleep next to her kitten.

* * *

 **And thus is the start of a new day and age!**

 **Don't forget:**

 **R &R!**


End file.
